Congenial Conclusion
by WhenISayFriend
Summary: Things happen during the events as chronicled, from John's point of view, in "Closed Record". This is the other side of that story, Sherlock's five hundred and one days after the Fall. Since nothing's ever easy where he is concerned, things will be told in reverse chronological order. Expect glimpses into other characters' lives and thoughts, as well.
1. Prologue

**This one's for my incredible "booting" beta Impractical Beekeeping.  
Well, Bee. As gifts go, it's a bit weird, I know, seeing how you have had, and will have, to put so much work into it, yourself. And stand my whining and complaining...  
Still, this one definitely IS for you, and wouldn't ever exist without your own brilliant, inspiring stories, all your insight and the fun we have plotting, and... otherwise ;)  
One warning applies, though. Should there be stagnation, be sure I'll point an accusing finger at you and the Usurper :p**

This companion piece to my first story "Closed Record" (which I do recommend reading first) has been long in the making, I know. I really hope that some of my readers from back then will come by, and that you **all** have fun with this story. It would be great if you'd drop a line to let me know!

* * *

It may be wise to point out once again, here, that** this story is being told in reverse order**...

* * *

**Prologue**

_The king is dead, long live the king._

_Allegiance to a man cannot last beyond death, because that would be a sentimental notion, and a useless one, too. Those graffiti across all across the city are a laughable denial of this._

_Allegiance to a cause is what keeps something as finely wrought and beautifully balanced as James' operation running like a well oiled machine, the cogs and tiny whirring wheels hardly taking any notice of its centre piece having gone._

_It is at once awe-inspiring and infuriating, this expendability._

_It is, however, impossible to let something die that has been brought to life with so much genius and labour. A true labour of love. Well, that, and money, persuasion, dissimulation, blackmail, baits and murder._

_But it's over now, for James, it is. It isn't over for Moran, by a long shot, though._

_Moran reviews the latest events, still dismayed at the outcome, if truth be told. Because the story has taken a turn James did not openly discuss beforehand, but it is not hard to see that, ever changeable, he merely adapted to the situation. And now he's gone and Moran's the one left._

_You cannot simply inherit an empire. History has a clear view on that kind of thing._

_For now, the burden is not keeping it alive, though; it's finishing a storyline that has been in the making for over two decades. It's not allegiance to a dead man to want to do this. It deserves to be finished. This will be about making sure things happen as James would have wanted them to._

_And punishing the right people in case they do not. Moran, as surprising as the final outcome was, was with James long enough to know exactly who those are, and what it entails, and what that comprises. Moran is holding the cards close; the trump._

_Moriarty has never been James alone, a fact that he never even tried to hide. Quite the opposite, in fact. The iceman is certain to be looking for them, Moran thinks. And should he take one step in the wrong direction, or should anything seem foul after all… well, he's holding the trump card, even though nobody knows that. Maybe no one ever will._

_Although that would almost be a pity._


	2. 1 - Five Hundred and One

**Events in this chapter correspond with those of chapter 24 of the companion piece "Closed Record".**

* * *

**1 - Five Hundred and One  
**

The streets are getting dark when he leaves the building with the convenient lavatory. Roughing it to skip from Mycroft's radar is fine by him, although with his brother's continuous climb up the obscure ladder of the truly powerful, eluding him has become ridiculously more laborious than it was twenty, or even ten, years ago. Returning to Molly was out of the question, for several reasons. Hell, he dares not even stay under the same _bridge_ for two nights.

As he steps on the gritty concrete, an icy autumn wind lifts and swirls the remnants, not of nature but civilisation, on the ground. Food wrappings (bought at the vending machine on the ground floor of the office building), paper handkerchiefs (source indeterminable without chemical analyses – not that he'd care much to rely on a sample of snot), a drinking straw from a nearby cocktail bar (used in something containing curaçao), a plastic bag (from a cheap boutique down the street) blown into the air like some mini-balloon, a neon-pink little something that it takes him a second to recognise as a fingernail. An artificial one, he supposes, although, in close proximity to hospitals, you can find strange things, at times.

Speaking of strange things. He eyes the bad replica of nineteenth century clothing of the couple overtaking him in his (apparently) leisurely stroll, sneering at the zipper down the woman's back, and the polyester-sheen of the gentleman's frock coat. If people wanted to dress up as something they were not… Hell, why should he even think about the bad taste and historical ignorance of people._ So as to not to have to think about anything of importance, of course… _

Such as: You cannot prove that something does _not_ exist.

You cannot prove that zippers did _not_ exist in ladies' costumes of the 1890ies. You cannot prove aliens did _not_ land on Earth four thousand years back and built the pyramids. You cannot prove Atlantis had _not_ existed.

Non-existence is logically unprovable.

Mathematically speaking, he knows, that is too simplistic, not an absolute statement. You can prove, in a set frame of axioms, that certain elements cannot solve certain equations; you can prove that no _rational_ number exists to solve x²=2. So simple.

But a _solution_ does exist, nonetheless. It is not even that mathematicians had to willfully expand the defining framework, it… evolved. By asking questions that aim outside of the given universe, that same universe forms new parts, of necessity and the laws of ultimate, transcendental logic. Irrational numbers, for all their un-endearing name, are beautiful things that demonstrate the superiority of logic like few things do.

So you can rule out existence only when you completely know, or when it is in your power to define, the referential framework.

But it is not _he _who dictated this reality's axioms. (Though the fact that he is walking this street, in this very moment, means he has bent the rules set by Moriarty.) Oh, he has learnt very much about the game. The intelligence he has gathered over the past five hundred days are shining in his mind like a beautiful, intricate, complex spider's web; yet, for all that he knows what governs Morarty's gossamer network, there can be no doubt that the dead man was the only one (if anyone) who had fully grasped the fundamental laws that govern his very own universe.

It is not proof that something does not exist, that you cannot _find_ evidence for it.

Five hundred days of fruitless search, of interminable deductive sequences, have not yielded anything tangible. And while Sherlock tends to ascribe meaning to that fact, it is _proof_ of nothing at all.

.

It is a testimony to the degree of his preoccupation, that he catches on to the current date only, when he sees a slip of a girl (Long-term anorexic. _See her teeth?_ No drugs, though. Ring imprint on left ring finger. So, dark circles under her eyes and bad complexion due to unfaithful boyfriend.) dressed in a decidedly inappropriate skimpy and torn dress (hoping to remedy the boyfriendless situation), sporting an artificial slash, fashioned from latex and dark red nail polish for blood, on her right cheek. He stifles the sudden, utterly unexpected urge to snort. It is the 31st of October, of all days...

Tonight, as folklore goes, the boundaries between the worlds are penetrable, the dead can escape wherever they are supposed to be contained. Or residing. He frowns, wondering what the accurate, ecclesiastical (esoteric) technical term is. In ancient times this was no night of joy and feasts. People had been afraid of the return of dead people then. Had buried them with their shoes interchanged and their knives dulled.

It is a good thing, that John-

There surely are a great number of people that he would not care to see come back to life. Moriarty's ghost is haunting him enough as it is, and – although he can to the best of his memory not recall ever having seen the man laugh – it is always laughing at him. About some private joke he is afraid he is starting to understand now.

Ghosts, of course, are another of those things whose non-existence have shown itself to be impossible to prove.

He has become a ghost, too, in all meaningful respects. Although he, arguably, lacks the distinctive feature of having died. Which is what makes the mistake he _knows_ he is about to make possible, of course. A mistake he has avoided making for five hundred days.

If it _is_ a mistake.

_Please, don't be dead. For me._ John's voice echoes in his head, hollow. Frowning, he wonders if he had not overestimated John's rationality when it came to the non-existence of ghosts.

Wonder about your own rationality, why don't you.

Point taken.

_You ought to go._

_I surely ought not. _

_We wouldn't be having this conversation if you were convinced of that._

_It is likely to get us both killed._

_Is that why you don't go, though?_

Of course it is. Is it?

He is not going to return before he has got conclusive evidence that the danger is past. _Sherlock? _

But proving something doesn't exist is still impossible, of course. So that day might well be never.

Infinity is another mathematical concept he rather likes. After all, he's kept himself going by the comforting certainty of the non-Euclidean imaginary point...

.

Three days ago now, the equation was altered. Not by the dead man peacefully being annihilated chemically in the ground somewhere, obviously.

Disappointment is not the issue. It is the possible reach of effects; could the transformation mean that what he has steadfastly told himself is running on parallel course, is in fact following skew lines?

The dread that ensues from the new pieces of information (or high treason) has driven him away from the place where he knows he ought to be. Finishing the job. Finding a killer. A killer that might _finally_ lead them - lead him - to Moran.

For three days, he has been re-assessing the entire situation, travelling again all the major lines of reasoning that led to his leaving Baker Street, leaving his life. He arrived over and over again at the conclusion that he _is_ taking the logical course. That he still has to do this, save John by keeping away, removing himself as far as possible from him – and for all this unchanged and absolute awareness Sherlock is afraid that he cannot do it anymore. Because _hoping_ for an intersect to happen is not enough to go on.

He is worn to the bone. The – obejctively - continuous passing of time has neither steeled his resolve nor, as he had been half hoping, effectuated a decrease in his wish to return. It has merely worn him down, exhausted his strength of will and is, right now, eroding the pride that is all that has kept him going for some time now. All that is left is his sheer stubbornness, a natural force to be reckoned with, sure, but not enough to keep him on course any longer, now.

Because you can _never_ prove that something does not exist.

What if _that_ is exactly how this was meant to work?

The moment he realised what the transformative revelation means with regard to the probability of this hypothesis – which he disregarded before - was the second, the very instant that he knew he was fucked.

* * *

Mrs Hudson slaps him hard across the cheek, leaving a stinging imprint on his skin, and dissolves into a fit of… rage, after that.

He had prepared himself for tears on her part, he had resigned himself to letting her embrace him, was willing to offer comfort in a far more forthcoming manner than he was usually comfortable with, or inclined to.

Now he is standing just inside the hallway at the backdoor, stunned, and watching Mrs Hudson take several steps back, ranting at him. It takes a moment to register, what exactly she is saying.

"How _could_ you?" Nothing unexpected there. "Sherlock! He's a good man, he's the only one I've ever seen you happy with. How on earth could you do this to him?" The elderly lady's eyes are still dry, and they are blazing with fury. "It almost killed him. I expected to find him dead upstairs one morning."

His face must be rather alarming, or maybe she is running out of steam, because Mrs Hudson eventually turns her back and leads the way to her kitchen, leaving the door open for him. She offers nothing by the way of a late night snack, though, simply sits down, drawing her dressing gown close to her, and stares at him. "So, what have you got to say, Sherlock?"

"Is he at home?" he finally asks.

"Even if he was, you can't –" Mrs Hudson's face crumples, and she suddenly loses her composure.

Sherlock puts his hand tentatively on her shoulder but she swats it away and puts her face in her hands. "Go away," she sniffs.

.

She had not told him where to go. She had not ordered him to leave her house, either.

The stair creaks. The scratches in the wallpaper are fainter, half-healed by some glue. The window looking out to the backyard has been cleaned recently. The door at the top landing is open, and the step through it like a step out of a frame that he's been living in for seventeen months. _This is a mistake, _the light switch whispers to him, when it allows him to see. But he is already in the middle of the room, trying to make sense of _anything_ he sees (books on politics, not something John has ever shown an interest in, so who left them in a pile next to the sofa, who has been sleeping on his sofa, because it has been used as a bed frequently, why is the ashtray there, has John taken up smoking, what are those print-outs about the Iraq War and the fall of Baghdad doing on the table, where has the skull gone again. how can so little have changed, how is that even possible.), when panic hits him.

Then, a key is being turned, no voices, just a pattern of steps, and a cane. A creak. More steps. The door he inadvertently half closed behind him swings open again.

He watches, anxiety buzzing in his ears like bees, the impressions he is perceiving going straight through his brain to the part of him he still refuses to call his heart. It seems to mean that he cannot make sense of what he sees, in his usually instant, analytical manner.

John stills at the sight of him. He stands preternaturally still, frozen, apart from his lips opening in a sudden need for air. His lids slide down slowly, and slightly out of sync with each other, the very picture of shock. And then his lips start trembling – it is like watching his face, this so much missed – and oddly changed – face crumble. Tears rush to his eyes, spilling over, running down cheeks and chin and falling in one single instance.

Sherlock has never felt as shocked himself as he does now, taking in this display of... pain. He _cannot_ be responsible for this, for all this, surely. He is not a person anyone... anyone... His thoughts are stuck in confused waters, too deep for him. It has never occurred to him that _this_ might be the kind of hurt John is going through. Because of _him_.

John squeezes his eyes shut, fighting for air now in a desperate, hitching rhythm, never able to draw more than a tiny bit of breath into his lungs, like something was blocking his throat. Or choking him.

After several more attempts to draw air into his lungs, all the while those terrible choking noises like blows to Sherlock's stomach, John folds in on himself like a house of cards, silently and elegantly collapsing for good.

.

It is not a case of reality lagging behind an imagined course of events. It is like an alternate reality where he is playing a role he doesn't recognise himself in, doing things he could not have scripted for himself. What they are, or why he is doing them, he only has time to consider later, when John has fallen asleep in the way other people lose consciousness.

He understands one thing immediately, though, the second John's fingers catch his wrist (a gesture so simple he doesn't even question its legitimacy) – instantly tethering him, body and mind. Tethering should make him want to recoil and shake himself free, but the only feeling it does evoke is the instinct that he has, indeed, returned home.

He has forsook feeling connected for as long as he remembers being capable of thinking about such things. Keeping afloat on a cushion of superiority that he knows exists – enabling him to forego what others call essential to a good life, and condemning him to the same thing – led him into a dead-end, and quite early in his life. Total independence, as advantageous as it was in pure thought and intellect, brought on a personal destructive impetus Sherlock has never felt compelled to really examine.

It did a good deal of damage to some of his tenets (he would never willingly call beliefs) but he found a solution when he first decided to... tether his mind to a specific cause, for the first time consciously imposing _any_ kind of order to his rampant mind, really. The Work.

He had never imagined a reason for, or the possibility of, tethering it to a _person_.

Keeping vigil that night, sitting on the floor against the sofa, he finally sees that he was caught in a chain-reaction, domino pieces falling, inexorably, one after the other. He recognises it now, two times five hundred days after. One thing led to another, within and without.

He _loves_ watching the pieces falling around him.

He hates the pieces falling inside just as uncontrollably. But fallen they have, and the logic to the process is undeniable now.

Caring is not an advantage. Mycroft has never said anything more accurate, Sherlock realises. Maybe it is one true thing he's ever said to him in their lives. Watching John now, he understands for the first time, that there is no choice, though, as he has so long believed. You cannot decide for yourself whether or not you care about certain people. He could not, and John couldn't either, or he would surely not have chosen _this_.

.

When he wakes to the dim November light, John is gone. Just like that. And Sherlock knows _that_ is not good at all.


	3. Interlude I

**AN:** WELL. This story IS, obviously, AU as of last night. I haven't watched The Empty Hearse yet, though, and even when I have, I'll try my very best to continue this story, because it seems a pity not to finish, as it's complementing my first story - which is just as AU now, of course...  
Still, there may be people who enjoy, and I assure you that a single comment will make a major difference in the speed that this story will be updated! All the best and a Happy New Year!

Okay, maybe it's time to explain this a little, as it's not (primarily ;)) my aim to confuse my readers here. As the story note states, this story is told in reverse order, beginning, as you will have noticed, with Sherlock's and John's reunion. It will move backwards in time now, and all the "regular" chapters will be from Sherlock's perspective, just as all chapters of the companion piece "Closed Record" were from John's.  
However, while writing, I found it necessary and advantageous to integrate other people's views on the events described by John and Sherlock. So far, it seems like there's going to be an "Interlude" between all regular chapters, told from alternating perspectives. They are placed on the same timeline as the chapters, so this very first Interlude takes place BEFORE the previous chapter Five Hundred and One, but AFTER the upcoming Chapter 2.  
Apropos. I am certain that I'm not the only person to find this annoying, but there is no way of avoiding the automatic numbering of chapters, so the prologue, chapters and interludes are named "chapter" indiscriminately, which is not ideal.  
Whenever I write about a certain chapter number, I am talking about MY numbering system ;)

* * *

_Interlude I_

The morgue is quiet. It always is, of course, but it has become more so since Sherlock's – ever exciting – visits to the place ended with him an occupant in the square honeycomb of bodies. For a moment, she wonders why no one has ever thought of making hexagonal compartments to economise, but then the image of the dead as pale larvae put even her off enough to make her concentrate on the task at hand. Or maybe it _is_ thinking about Sherlock.

Ever since this madness started, her life has felt unreal, put on hold, somehow. The less she sees of him now, the more certain she becomes that some catastrophe is waiting to happen. It could be just her conscience, because isn't lying one of the deadly sins?

The phone on the wall starts ringing, making her jump where she is standing lost in thought.

.

Ten minutes later, she has taken Ron Adair to the slightly more temperate examination room. He's lying on the slab now; it might be the same one she showed Sherlock on. It is not, she knows – and this man is dead, too. Molly looks down at the peaceful face, and up into the bloodshot eyes of the DI. He has not given any explanation for his sudden interest in the deceased, who she examined over a week ago. Suspicious death, the form had said. Because nobody should kill himself at that age, being in such excellent health.

She sneaks another glance at the detective. Lestrade has never looked as bad as this, she thinks, not during the investigations he was subject to following Sherlock's death, not even when Andrea left him with the children. She learnt all this overhearing the idle chatter of other people, unkind commentary on a man that some couldn't seem to wait to see degraded.

She feels a pang of guilt for having been so caught up in her own misery, when really she had the advantage of knowing the truth. She might have stuck up for him, in some way, she supposed. But she is a coward when it comes down to it. The idea of becoming the target of her colleagues mockery, once again, or of inadvertently betraying, not herself but Sherlock's secret, effectively sealed her lips.

In the absolute quiet of the white-tiled room she notices her heartbeat gradually picking up as more and more time passes. She does have a tendency to lose track of time, but the large, station-like wall clock assures her that the detective has indeed been standing there mutely for a full five minutes.

"He's told me." Lestrade's voice, when it finally comes, is toneless, slightly above a whisper and rough, while he keeps assessing the body (and why is Adair lying there, really?) between them with an intensity that goes straight through the object he pretends to examine. "That... that Sherlock's not dead."

Molly's breath catches, and her knuckles turn white with the force of her gripping the edge of the stainless steel table. Should she say something? she wonders.

"_You_ did it, didn't you? Help him. It _must_ have been you." He's talking fast now, and more loudly, but Molly is not sure about his tone.

She nods nonetheless, making herself square her shoulders and look up. She does not know what to expect from the DI. She has never been sure about him, or his relationship with Sherlock, really, and apart from the most awkward Christmas party in living memory, – and the funeral – she has never even met the man outside of work.

"I wouldn't believe him at first, you know. I saw Sherlock's body; after all, there was a certificate. Hell, there was a _burial_." He swallows, patently remembering the short ceremony in the cemetery, and all the unpleasantness that surrounded it, as well as she does. "There even were a few people who mourned for the mad bastard."

Suddenly, Molly feels cold to the bone. "You don't understand," she tries.

"Damn right, I _don't_. And I don't care for being told another bunch of lies and secrets. Particularly the kind that _I_ have to live with afterwards! And decide whether or not to keep!" His eyes are drilling into hers, and she is almost glad to see anger there now. "What, in God's name, was he thinking? What has John, or Mrs Hudson, done to deserve _that_?" His voice is sharp, bitter in a way that isn't in keeping with his usual self, she thinks. "Come to think of it, not even _I_ might have!"

"No! I know, you don't," and that is really all she wants to tell him, but then the words just keep tumbling out. "But Sherlock didn't, either. He was so _afraid_. I couldn't let him down. I don't know what mad plan he would have come up with had I said no. He never told me how long he would have to... He made me promise. But when things didn't get better, not for John, or anyone, and not for Sherlock, either, I thought I should tell you all anyway, but I just could not. Because what if he was right, what if you would be dead if you knew? It would have-"

"Now, wait a second. What... what the _hell_ are you talking about?"

"Moriarty had..." The words dry out. She should not even be aware of this, she knows. Sherlock had wanted her to know as little as possible about the matter. But she is no fool.

"Moriarty has been dead for almost a year and a half!"

"_He_ has, but all of this was Moriarty's plan. He had every contingency covered long before they ever met up on the roof." Molly's eyes move upwards in both a reference to the scene of the man's death and a tired plea for Lestrade to understand what she is saying without her having to spell it out.

"He– " Lestrade's eyes narrow. He draws a deep breath that drains away too early. "Moriarty threatened to kill…" She sees him weighing the options in his mind. And, predictably, he goes with the one she saw first, as well. "Are you telling me he's been doing this to _protect_ John?"

And because she really should not know any better, she nods, but looks away, at the incision forming a neat letter Y on Adair's chest.

"That is mad, even by his standards."

"It's not mad," she claims. But of course it _is_; she's thought so a hundred times herself.

"Molly... Dr Hooper," he says, correcting himself, which gives her the opportunity to cut his protestations short.

"Oh, I know! It was not a _good_ things to do, you can't call it that, of course. But he didn't have much time to plan things out. He was... well. He was desperate when he understood what was going to happen. Or do you think he would have asked _me,_ of all people, for help? I don't think he ever meant for it to take this long. But he had to keep going." She tries to make this less of a rant, but is not sure she'll be able to make much sense. Not after all this time, when she is feeling and fearing too much. "You know how I know how bad it is for him? That it's been hell for him? He has not asked about him _once_! I don't think he has even said John's name out loud. And I _tried_ talking about John with him, believe me! And then I didn't for a bit, but then he did, kind of." Lestrade's frown makes her stop to breathe, at last.

"I told him when they hospitalised him after that breakdown. I was hoping... I was sure Sherlock would finally stop this, let him know, because..." Lestrade is looking at her strangely now. "But he just said I had to _do something_ about... about John, and I thought, great, what can I possibly do? I mean, I haven't been able to look him in the eye, let alone _talk_ to him. But I went upstairs to check on him and fled when he woke up... So, I couldn't. It was... But then I _did_ do something, and... and now..." She stops herself stammering, and swallows down the inappropriate tears scratching at the back of her throat. "He said I was the only one he could trust, but he _can't_. Because now I have to keep secrets from him, too, and he must know that. Of course he knows – but he still doesn't ask. I wonder – I wonder why he doesn't want to know; because it's not something he does, not wanting to know, is it? So I figured, maybe he..." She is suddenly too tired to go on.

"You know, that is _not_ the story Mycroft Holmes was telling me yesterday..."

"_Mycroft_ Holmes?"

"...when John came to my office to tell me about the wed-" He stops mid-word, turning a weird shade of sallow.

"I am to be a bridesmaid," Molly offers incongruously.

"Brides-" Lestrade stares at her like noticing for the first time that he is talking to a lunatic. "Sherlock doesn't know?"

Not that she hasn't been trying to tell him exactly that all the time. She shakes her head minutely. Two tears drip onto Adair's upper arm and run down onto the shining steel beneath.

"I _couldn't_ tell him," she forces out, wiping the salty water from the dead man's skin. "He is _this_ close to going off the rails, and I know he's been holding on only... only because he knows – because he thinks he can go home afterwards." Her voice finally breaks.

"Molly... It's not your fault."

She gives him a strange, crooked smile.

"How on _earth_ have you been able to stand it?" It is not quite a question. And if it is meant to be one, she is not sure if they are talking about the same thing.

"I am glad that you know now," she admits and wipes at her eyes. "Does that mean he's coming back soon?"

Lestrade shrugs. "It means he needs my help, apparently."

.

One and a half hour after the call, Lestrade leaves with an assortment of Ron Adair's bodily fluids, tissue samples, lab results and CT scans. He waves them in an absentminded farewell gesture.

With an uncomfortable feeling that she has missed something there – but that might well also have something to do with talking to anybody about things long concealed – she returns the dead man to his cubicle.

"I doubt my brother will thank you for this indiscretion," the lanky man leaning against the mortuary refrigerator remarks. "But then, Sherlock has never been able to appreciate concern."

* * *

For the best Bee, which doesn't really need saying, as the entire story is. Still. Since I can't do more than write to distract you right now, I will just keep doing that ;)


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